In August 1945, the US president, Harry Truman, ordered a nuclear attack against Japan:on the 6th they launched Little Boy about Hiroshima and 9 Fat Man over Nagasaki. On August 15, Japan announced its unconditional surrender to the Allies... World War II was over . But there was an American soldier who saved his life thanks to the bomb that fell on Nagasaki... Lieutenant Marcus McDilda .
Little Boy
The atomic bombs were decisive for Japan to make that decision but for several months many other cities had been subjected to B-29 bombing even after the launch of Little Boy. On August 7, Lieutenant McDilda, pilot of a P-51 Mustang fighter which was flying as an escort for the bombers, was shot down. He was taken to a Japanese military police center (Kempeitai ) in Osaka for questioning. The Japanese were especially interested in knowing everything about the new weapon used in Hiroshima, the atomic bomb. Logically, McDilda had the only information that was circulating around the air base, but nothing that could interest the Japanese. So, he denied over and over again that he knew anything. From good words he went on to blows and the lieutenant thought that he would not get out of there alive. At night, a Kempeitai officer entered his cell and put a katana to his face, made a small cut and when the blood began to fall on his uniform...
If you don't speak, I will cut your throat.
McDilda decided to take a chance and if they wanted him to talk, he would. Pulling from what he had heard from the barracks gossip, from what he had read about nuclear fission and using a lot of imagination, he explained to them how the atomic bomb works and, furthermore, added that the United States had dozens of bombs of this type and that the next target would be Tokyo. That set off all the alarms, they brought him to the attention of the government and they were ordered to transfer him to Tokyo. There, he was questioned again by a scientist who had been trained in the US... logically, he discovered that McDilda had no idea what he was saying. They both laughed and the lieutenant was waiting what they decided to do with him after discovering his deception. The next day, the US dropped Fat Man on Nagasaki. This made the Japanese assume that although the prisoner had no idea about the atomic bomb, it seemed certain that they had more atomic bombs. The rest of the 50 airmen who were prisoners with the lieutenant in Osaka had been executed on the night of August 7…Marcus McDilda's lie and the dropping of the bomb saved his life.
Fat Man